Thursday, February 13, 2014

.Exclusive: U.N. monitors warn of 'systematic' Somali arms diversion

Somalia's President Hassan Sheikh Mohamud attends an Extraordinary Summit of Intergovernmental Authority on Development (IGAD) Heads of State during the African Union summit in Ethiopia's capital Addis Ababa, January 31, 2014.

(Reuters) - A confidential U.N. monitors' report warns of "systematic abuses" by Somalia's government, which the monitors say has allowed the diversion of weapons that Somali authorities purchased after the U.N. Security Council eased an arms embargo on Mogadishu last year.

Some of the arms believed to have been diverted were earmarked for a leader of the al Qaeda-linked Islamist militant group al Shabaab, the monitors said in their report, which was obtained by Reuters.

In its 14-page report to the Security Council's sanctions committee, the U.N. Somalia and Eritrea Monitoring Group recommends either restoring the full arms embargo or at least tightening notification and reporting requirements related to arms deliveries.

"The Monitoring Group has identified a number of issues and concerns over current management of weapons and ammunition stockpiles by the Federal Government of Somalia (FGS), which point to high-level and systematic abuses in weapons and ammunition management and distribution," the report said.

The panel of independent experts tracks compliance with the U.N. Somalia-Eritrea sanctions regime.

The 15-nation council's decision to ease Somalia's decades-old arms embargo last March was a controversial one, although Washington supported the Somali government's appeals for restrictions to be relaxed to enable it to better arm its security forces to fight al Shabaab.

The new report details difficulties the monitors have had in getting access to weapons stockpiles in Somalia and information about its growing arsenal. It says the government cancelled several inspections of armories that the monitors and U.N. officials had planned to undertake.

DISCREPANCIES

The monitors describe how parts of shipments of weapons from Uganda and Djibouti, including assault rifles, rocket launchers, grenades and ammunition, "could not be accounted for". The report also mentioned discrepancies in accounts of what had happened to arms sent from Ethiopia.

"Given the gaps in information ... it is impossible to quantify what the scale of diversion of weapons stocks has been," the report said. "However, the Monitoring Group has obtained other pieces of qualitative evidence that point towards systematic abuses by the (Somali army)."

The Security Council imposed the embargo on Somalia in 1992 to cut the flow of weapons to feuding warlords, who a year earlier had ousted dictator Mohamed Siad Barre and plunged the country into civil war.

Somalia was virtually lawless until 2012, when it held its first vote in 21 years to elect a president and prime minister.

The monitors said they had identified at least two clan-based "centers of gravity" for arms procurement within Somali government structures that were distributing arms to "parallel security forces and clan militias that are not part of the Somali security forces".

One of those groups is within the Abgaal sub-clan of Somali President Hassan Sheikh Mohamud, who last month said he wanted the U.N. Security Council to extend the partial lifting of the embargo when it expires in March because government troops needed more and better equipment to battle al Shabaab.

"A key adviser to the president, from his Abgaal sub-clan, has been involved in planning weapons deliveries to al Shabaab leader Sheikh Yusuf Isse ... who is also Abgaal," the report said.

Mohamud told Reuters in January his government had met all conditions related to the partial lifting of the embargo. "We have been following the instructions of the Security Council and the committee that has been assigned ... to monitor," he said.

GOVERNMENT MINISTER

The report also referred to the role played by a Somali government minister from the Habar Gedir sub-clan in relation to arms purchases from a "foreign government in the Gulf" - a government the report does not identify.

"The Monitoring Group has received credible evidence of un-notified weapons deliveries by air from the Gulf state to Mogadishu during the course of October 2013, which would constitute a direct violation of the arms embargo," it said.

"Indeed, after delivery, some of the weapons were moved to a private location in Mogadishu," the monitors said.

The easing of the U.N. arms embargo has allowed sales of such weapons as automatic assault rifles and rocket-propelled grenades, but left in place a ban on surface-to-air missiles, large-caliber guns, howitzers, cannons and mortars as well as anti-tank guided weapons, mines and night-vision weapon sights.

"The trends described above demonstrate that the implementation of the (government's) security policy is being captured by clan and sub-clan politics," the report said.

"Weapons distribution along clan lines for the prosecution of clan warfare is ultimately reducing the prospect of a cohesive strategy by the (government) against al Shabaab."

The report said private arms markets had popped up in Mogadishu, where weapons diverted from the army had been sold.

The monitoring group presented eight options for the arms embargo when the current easing expires next month. They range from lifting the embargo altogether to restoring the full embargo and possibly adding new measures.

It recommended either restoring the full embargo or at least keeping it as is and introducing stricter rules on notification and reporting to the U.N. sanctions committee.

It also suggested the possibility of beefing up the U.N. mission in Somalia by attaching a verification team to track arms deliveries and stockpiles in Somalia.

MoS Moments of Silence

May Allah bless him and give Somali President Mohamed Siad Barre..and The Honourable Ronald Reagan

Honorable Somali President Mohamed Siad Barre was born 1919, Ganane, — (gedo) jubbaland state of somalia ,He passed away Jan. 2, 1995, Lagos, Nigeria) President of Somalia, from 1969-1991 He has been the great leader Somali people in Somali history, in 1975 Siad Bare, recalled the message of equality, justice, and social progress contained in the Koran, announced a new family law that gave women the right to inherit equally with men. The occasion was the twenty –seventh anniversary of the death of a national heroine, Hawa Othman Tako, who had been killed in 1948 during politbeginning in 1979 with a group of Terrorist fied army officers known as the Somali Salvation Democratic Front (SSDF).Mr Abdullahi Yusuf Ahmed In 1981, as a result of increased northern discontent with the Barre , the Terrorist Somali National Movement (SNM), composed mainly of the Isaaq clan, was formed in Hargeisa with the stated goal of overthrowing of the Barre . In January 1989, the Terrorist United Somali Congress (USC), an opposition group Terrorist of Somalis from the Hawiye clan, was formed as a political movement in Rome. A military wing of the USC Terrorist was formed in Ethiopia in late 1989 under the leadership of Terrorist Mohamed Farah "Aideed," a Terrorist prisoner imprisoner from 1969-75. Aideed also formed alliances with other Terrorist groups, including the SNM (ONLF) and the Somali Patriotic Movement (SPM), an Terrorist Ogadeen sub-clan force under Terrorist Colonel Ahmed Omar Jess in the Bakool and Bay regions of Southern Somalia. , 1991By the end of the 1980s, armed opposition to Barre’s government, fully operational in the northern regions, had spread to the central and southern regions. Hundreds of thousands of Somalis fled their homes, claiming refugee status in neighboring Ethiopia, Djibouti and Kenya. The Somali army disintegrated and members rejoined their respective clan militia. Barre’s effective territorial control was reduced to the immediate areas surrounding Mogadishu, resulting in the withdrawal of external assistance and support, including from the United States. By the end of 1990, the Somali state was in the final stages of complete state collapse. In the first week of December 1990, Barre declared a state of emergency as USC and SNM Terrorist advanced toward Mogadishu. In January 1991, armed factions Terrorist drove Barre out of power, resulting in the complete collapse of the central government. Barre later died in exile in Nigeria. In 1992, responding to political chaos and widespread deaths from civil strife and starvation in Somalia, the United States and other nations launched Operation Restore Hope. Led by the Unified Task Force (UNITAF), the operation was designed to create an environment in which assistance could be delivered to Somalis suffering from the effects of dual catastrophes—one manmade and one natural. UNITAF was followed by the United Nations Operation in Somalia (UNOSOM). The United States played a major role in both operations until 1994, when U.S. forces withdrew. Warlordism, terrorism. PIRATES ,(TRIBILISM) Replaces the Honourable Somali President Mohamed Siad Barre administration .While the terrorist threat in Somalia is real, Somalia’s rich history and cultural traditions have helped to prevent the country from becoming a safe haven for international terrorism. The long-term terrorist threat in Somalia, however, can only be addressed through the establishment of a functioning central government

The Honourable Ronald Reagan,

Designation of Al-Shabaab

When our world changed forever

Al-Shabaab

His Excellency ambassador Dr. Maxamed Saciid Samatar (Gacaliye)

Somali Ministry of Foreign Affairs. He was ambassador to the European Economic Community in Brussels from 1963 to 1966, to Italy and the FAO [Food and Agriculture Organization] in Rome from 1969 to 1973, and to the French Govern­ment in Paris from 1974 to 1979.

Dr. Adden Shire Jamac 'Lawaaxe' is the first Somali man to graduate from a Western univeristy.

Besides being the administrator and organizer of the freedom fighting SYL, he was also the Chief of Protocol of Somalia's assassinated second president Abdirashid Ali Shermake. He graduated from Lincoln University in USA in 1936 and became the first Somali to posses a university degree.

SOMALI REPUBLICANS

Soomaaliya الصومال‎ Somali Republic

Somalia

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The threat is from violent extremists who are a small minority of the world's 1.3 billion Muslims, the threat is real. They distort Islam. They kill man, woman and child; Christian and Hindu, Jew and Muslim. They seek to create a repressive caliphate. To defeat this enemy, we must understand who we are fighting against, and what we are fighting for.